Archive for the ‘Instagram’ tag

Jordan Spieth signing autographs for fans on the last day of practice rounds, which also happened to be his 23rd Birthday.

From July 25-31, MKTG hosted dozens of our clients and partners at the 2016 PGA Championship in our private VIP hospitality suite within the historic Club House at Baltusrol. Despite the hot and humid forecast, we all had a blast traversing the course catching some world-class golf.

We also all witnessed history as Jimmy Walker took home his first major title finishing -14 and holding on to the lead the entire time. Walker became the first wire-to-wire winner of the PGA Championship since Phil Mickelson, who won at Baltusrol in 2005. In fact, all four majors this year were won by first-timers including Masters champion Danny Willett; Dustin Johnson, who won the United States Open; and Henrik Stenson, the British Open champ. Walker had missed the cut in his last two majors, never finished higher than tied for seventh at any major and was perhaps best known on the PGA Tour for his unusual hobby: astrophotography, according to the New York Times.

In addition to witnessing Walker’s triumph, we saw reigning PGA Champion Jason Day, the world’s top ranked golfer, make the final holes crazy intense on Sunday , and even got up close and personal with stars like Jordan Spieth, Rory McIlroy, Dustin Johnson, John Daly, among others. Check out our snaps below and on Instagram and Snapchat.

MKTG’s Connor, Paige and Dan were onsite all week.

A view of the Clubhouse from the fairway of the historic 18th hole.

Dustin Johnson signing autographs for fans.

Rory McIlroy on the putting green prepping for the week at Baltusrol.

Dustin Johnson putting in some work at the driving range during the last day of practice rounds.

Jason Day getting ready to tee off on the fan favorite par 3, 4th hole, during his last practice round on Wednesday.

John Daly just being John Daly!

The par 5, 17th hole was a great spot.

Jimmy Walker getting up close and personal with some spectators on the 17th hole during his second round at Baltusrol.

Huge shout out to the totally tireless, amazing MKTG and Team Epic team effort out in San Francisco in pulling off no less than dozens of truly awesome activations.

In case you missed it, we’ve kept our social feeds active with content from the week including our very own video content series called “Theo on the Street” that we’ve posted to our brand newYouTube Channel as well as Facebook, Instagram, etc. Check it out below!

Theo on the Street: Super Bowl City & Levi’s Lot

Theo on the Street: NFL Experience

Be sure to follow all of our social channels below! This was for sure our best Super Bowl yet!

Digital Summit Atlanta, a gathering of some of the most forward thinkers in digital marketing, took place this week and I was proud to make it my 3rd time in attendance. Each year I have been able to discover new topics and discuss the next trends in digital marketing.

Overall, each year has followed its own theme as digital marketing as a whole evolves so quickly. In 2013, trends in how social media was changing for brands was explored in a lot of sessions. Last year it shifted to a major focus on content marketing and SEO. Now, at #DSUM15, the next stage in UX (User Experience) design seemed to be the key focus.

And with that, here are three key takeaways from the conference as it can relate to what we do in the experiential space…

1. Humanizing UX

Many of the sessions at Digital Summit really focused on UX as we were challenged to think of what was next in the field. For example, how do we run UX more lean and understand better, powered with ‘big data’, how to humanize someone’s digital experience. When we map out the consumer journey – remember that each user is an actual person with problems and needs.

When you look at bring a consumer through a brand experience for experiential this line of thinking makes a lot of sense, right? It is our expertise to bring brands to life in a way that they can interact with consumers as people and not anonymous IP addresses. However many activation designs we see in the field could do a better job from at the ideation stage to keep in mind that once launched, these are people with their own objectives who will walk through our ideas.

So when thinking through your consumer experience idea, map it out. Literally draw out each stage of the activation UX and use this tool to identify where the gaps are or more importantly, where it can be more streamlined.

2. Millennials are mobile-first…and are starting to earn a lot of money

When you hear the word “millennials” – how old of a person pops in your mind? Probably an early-20-something with new student debt maybe? Well consider that millennials are were born starting in 1980 and now are entering their mid-30s. Sure there is probably a healthy amount of debt still lingering – but this generation is now entering over a $Trillion in buying power and loves to spend.

So with all of this data we now have on the ‘Connected Generation’ – what have we learned about marketing to them? It’s a long answer but here are two quick tips from @annieg from StumbleUpon.

First, “6 is the new 60” – as in the 6” phone is more important than the 60” TV. Now that doesn’t mean the generation is consumer less video – in fact it’s more than ever. But reportedly 33% do not watch any broadcast TV.

Second, it seems obvious that millennials are connected to their mobile devices, sure, but how many experiences are being built mobile-first? When we consider social, if you stop to think why they are so effective with the connected generation it’s not just because they are social – but because the most popular experiences are mobile-first. Snapchat, Instagram, Vine…some of the most powerful platforms for the younger Millennials have excelled by being native to the 6” screen. So consider mobile-first experiences to connect and make an engagement that this group wants to use. After all, it is why the younger Millennials are now being known as Social Natives.

3. The Entrepreneur Wants to Solve a Problem

I heard a great line this year and it came during a keynote speaker Chris Brogan, whose content I highly recommend. To summarize:

Stop chasing innovation, which aims to just do something.

Be an entrepreneur, which aims to solve someone’s problem.

While this is absolutely a trap in creating the latest in digital experiences, it is also a trap in experiential marketing. Brands and agencies alike all want to innovate and create and truly great new things are activated in our space every year. But when coming up the ideas for the experience on the front end, don’t just try to chase an innovation for the sake of doing it. Instead, identify an audience’s problem and solve it. That is where the entrepreneurship mindset excels and where experiential marketing can truly make an in-person impact on someone.

If you are ever free in May, I highly recommend Digital Summit. This is only a small snipet of content from the 2-day conference. I still have to go through pages upon pages of notes but in the meantime, enjoy the learnings and feel free to find me @BradMEpstein if you want to go through my timeline where I shared some more real-time leanrings!

Bonus! PowerPoint is where data goes to die!

If you work with data (you should!) treat it as a living, breathing source. PowerPoint it becomes static and if 2015 taught me anything – is that static is kryptonite for the modern marketer. So learn new tools that keep you agile and keep your brand’s marketing velocity as fast as possible.